


You Can't Hurt Me Anymore

by captainamergirl



Category: General Hospital
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-31
Updated: 2016-10-31
Packaged: 2018-08-28 03:12:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,234
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8429272
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/captainamergirl/pseuds/captainamergirl
Summary: He put her through hell and now she's leaving.





	

**Author's Note:**

> A General Hospital one shot I wrote for a contest on Wattpad. The woman in this piece is unnamed so she can be anyone you imagine but since she is married to Jerry Jacks, you can bet she’s been through hell and that it’s more than past time for her to call it quits.

I didn’t sleep last night. Lying there, just listening to your ragged, nasal snores, a million thoughts kept turning over in my head. I knew come morning I had to make a choice - to stay or to go. I could choose a lifetime of doubts and fears, worries and uncertainty, or I could choose something else - something maybe, potentially, better. _I could choose myself. For once in my life, I could choose my own path, my own destiny._ The thought is scary as hell, because you know that I’ve never been very good at being alone; but the thought of staying here is even more terrifying.  
  
When morning finally came and I climbed out of bed, all it took was one look in the mirror, seeing that busted lip and blackened eye staring back at me to know what I had to do. I had to go. Being alone, being on my own with no one and nothing, has to be better than living a life like this. Because it’s no kind of life, is it, Jerry? You treating me the way you have during the past year .... breaking me down bit by bit with every word and every action, and finally with your fists … Well, it has destroyed whatever we once shared.  
  
I remember when we met that I was reluctant to trust you; to let you in. I’d been burned before, but you convinced me that despite your lifestyle, despite your brutal job, you were never going to hurt me the way you had your enemies -- enemies both real and imagined. You lied and somehow, along the way, I become your enemy too. _Why?_ Why did I become your enemy? I’ll never understand it. Is it really all because I had a few random conversations with Jason Morgan? Can you really actually believe that I’ve been conspiring with him and - how’d you put it? - _cavorting_ with him; running around behind your back with him? I am a lot of things but I'm not a betrayer; not a cheat. No, that’s who you are, Jerry. The sad thing, the one thing you’ll never understand, is that you’re the only man I’ve ever truly loved. But I pray to God (if He’s out there; if He’s listening), that somehow you’re not the last person I ever care so deeply for, because I don’t want my one taste of love to have been this bitter to swallow.  
  
At breakfast, you try to make it up to me. You try to put an icepack on my lip and feed me pancakes and orange juice. But the orange juice burns the cut, much the way your brand of love has burnt me. You say you’re sorry; you swear you’ll never lay a hand on me that way ever again; can’t we just forgive and forget and move on? No, no we can’t, because I don’t trust you anymore. I never will make that mistake again.  
  
I go to the door to bid you goodbye. You think it’s just for the day while you go about your business of decimating and destroying lives and expect me to turn a blind eye to it. I stupidly did for a long time, because I loved you, and because I was scared to be without you. Now I think I can do better. I have to believe I can do better or I won’t be able to walk away.  
  
You tell me you love me in that certain way of yours. Your accent used to drive me wild with desire, that bedroom voice and those beautiful eyes, used to intoxicate me so. Now it all leaves me feeling so cold, so sick. You kiss my cheek and stroke the column of my throat. The briefest flash of fear shoots through me. I think that you’re going to lock your hand around my neck and squeeze, but the moment passes and you say “see you soon, love” and you’re gone. But when you return tonight, _I’ll_ be gone.  
_  
It’s over._ I want to shout those words to you as you go. I want to scream them from the rooftops actually, but I just repeat them quietly to myself. I wish I could just walk out while you watched, but we both know you’d never let me, so I will have so sneak out for my own safety. Still, I’ll do it with my head held high somehow. I know I’ll have to look over my shoulder for a long time but at least I’ll be free. Free to maybe find myself.  
  
I allow myself one tear. Just one tear. The last tear I’ll ever cry for you. Then I hurry back upstairs and pack a small suitcase. I pull the cash I know you keep under the mattress out and put it with two pairs of denim jeans and a few blouses and a pair of flats. I dress in a simple black sheath dress that I hope will help me blend in at the airport. I don’t know where I’m going; I just know I’m going far away from here. Port Charles was supposed to be my home and I really believed that it was once upon a time. You turned it into hell, a prison, a field of landmines where if I made one wrong step, it’d all be over for me.  
  
I am done packing in ten minutes time. I carry the suitcase with me back downstairs. I take one look around the penthouse we shared. I start to reach for our wedding photograph but then slap my own hand away from it. I don’t want to touch it; I don’t dare. In fact, I never want to see it again. I don’t want to think of the vows we made that day - how we promised to love, honor, and cherish each other until the day we died. I know if I stay here, my expiration date will be a helluva lot sooner than I ever planned on.  
  
I open the door; then I close it after me and turn the key in the lock before tucking it under the welcome mat. Welcome indeed. _Welcome to hell._  
  
I ride down in the elevator and walk outside a bit hesitantly, almost expecting you to be lying in wait. You’re always one step ahead of everyone but you’re not here now. You must really believe I forgive you for all the pain and heartache you’ve caused. And hell, maybe one day I will, but today is not that day. Today I am hurt and today I am angry. But I promise you, Jerry, no matter what happens, I will never go back. I will go forward. I will make something of myself. I’ll get a degree and a good job. I’ll support myself. I’ll stand on my own two feet. If you taught me anything its that I’m stronger than I look, stronger than anyone ever gave me credit for, including myself.  
  
I hop into the car and start up the engine. I afford myself one last look at the penthouse we spent the past several years in together. And then I pull away from there. I put the place in my rearview mirror. I put it in the past. I put you in the past too where you belong. You can’t hurt me anymore. I won’t let you.  
**  
THE END.**


End file.
